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Latest reports an opportunity to reconsider name of new children's hospital - Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD

Sinn Féin TDs Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD and Louise O’Reilly TD have said that reports today that the Phoenix Children’s Hospital in Arizona is threatening legal action if the Minister for Health Simon Harris goes ahead and uses the same name for Ireland’s new children’s hospital is an opportunity for the Minister to reconsider the proposed title.

Sinn Féin has proposed a more appropriate name would be the Kathleen Lynn National Children’s Hopital and Aengus Ó Snodaigh TD has written to the last three Health Ministers suggesting the same and outlining the reasons why.

Teachta Ó Snodaigh said;

"Again in August both myself, in whose constituency the new hospital is being built, and my colleague Sinn Féin’s Health spokesperson Louise O’Reilly TD welcomed the fact the hospital was going to be secular, but also reiterated the call for the hospital to be named after Kathleen Lynn; a patriot, a woman, a suffragette, a medical pioneer and the founder of Ireland’s first children’s hospital St Ultan’s."

Louise O’Reilly TD said that;

“It is worrying that the Phoenix Children’s Hospital group in Arizona have stated it ‘will take whatever steps are necessary to protect its name, goodwill and the integrity of its reputation’ and has called on Minister Harris to act to change the proposed name which was wrong on a number of fronts”.

Deputy Ó Snodaigh said

“There is widespread and cross-party support for the naming of the new hospital to be the Kathleen Lynn Children’s Hospital in recognition for her important role in delivering medical care for the women and children of Dublin, the poor in particular and for her pioneering vision in setting up and running St Ultan’s Hospital.

“The site of the new hospital was the site of one of the Republican strongholds during the 1916 Rising, the South Dublin Union, and Citizen Army Commandant Kathleen Lynn was prominent during the Rising and after.

"A Mayo woman, she challenged many of the norms in society at the time in relation to women; being a suffragette, a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, the first resident doctor in the Eye and Ear Hospital, instrumental in the roll-out of the BCG vaccine, a soup kitchen worker during Lock Out 1913, a Citizen Army Volunteer and the Officer Commanding of the City Hall garrison at the end of Easter Week 1916, a prisoner of war, a TD and a Councillor, as well as a founder of St Ultan’s Hospital where she worked until she was over 80.

“I would find it hard to find a more suitable candidate for having a children’s hospital named after and I believe the minister should ‘tapaigh an deis’ (grasp the opportunity) and announce that the long-awaited new children’s hospital is to be the Kathleen Lynn Children’s Hospital.”